Main menu

Pages

Monday, December 06, 2010

Easy Recipe for Italian Sausage, Tomato, and Macaroni Soup with Basil

Italian Sausage, Tomato, and Macaroni Soup with Basil is easy and family friendly!

Every winter I try hard to remind myself there are lots of places where the weather gets much colder than it does in Salt Lake, and really I'm lucky not to be living in one of those ultra-cold spots. (Chicago, Minnesota, and North Dakota, I'm sending warm vibes.) Still, even if it's not as bitterly cold as some places, Utah is plenty cold this time of year. It's cold enough that nothing sounds much better than a bowl of comforting soup. This Italian Sausage, Tomato, and Macaroni Soup with Basil is one I came up with for a family party, and when it was a hit at the party, I wished I'd written down the recipe. Luckily I managed to re-create it a few days later, and now I have a few containers of this in the freezer for those cold winter nights.

This is an easy-to-make family-friendly soup recipe that can be made in just a little over a half hour. The addition of chopped basil at the end really adds a lot of flavor, but I use chopped frozen basil, which also works well here. If you do end up having quite a bit of this soup left over, the macaroni will absorb some of the liquid and make the soup quite a bit thicker than it would be if you ate it right away. You can always add a bit more chicken stock when you re-heat it if you'd like a thinner soup, or just invite friends over when you make it and I guarantee there won't be leftovers.

Combine chicken stock, dried basil, ground fennel, and petite dice tomatoes with juice and let the mixture simmer to blend flavors while you cook the sausage.

Heat olive oil in heavy frying pan, then squeeze turkey Italian sausage out of the links and cook until the sausage is nicely browned; breaking apart with a metal turner.

Add the sausage to the simmering soup pot, then add a tiny bit more olive oil if needed and saute onion about 3-4 minutes, or until starting to soften. Add minced garlic and saute 1-2 minutes more. Add the onion and garlic to soup pot and simmer 15 minutes.

Then add 1 cup dry macaroni to the soup pot and simmer on low for about 15 minutes more, or until macaroni is soft. (I used Dreamfields Macaroni, which is a low-carb product that tastes just like regular macaroni.)

Put chicken stock in large heavy soup pot and start to heat. Add the dried basil, ground fennel, and 2 cans petite dice tomatoes with juice and let the mixture simmer while you cook the sausage.

Heat 1 T of olive oil in a heavy frying pan. Squeeze the sausage out of casings and cook until nicely browned, breaking apart with a metal turner as the sausage cooks. Add browned sausage to the soup pot.

Add the other tsp. of olive oil to the frying pan if needed, then saute the onions for 3-4 minutes, or until they are starting to soften. Add the minced garlic and cook 1-2 minutes more. Add the onion and garlic to the soup pot. Deglaze the frying pan with about 1 cup of stock from the pot, adding that back to the soup. Let this simmer on low heat for 15-20 minutes.

Add the macaroni, stir, and continue to simmer the soup for 15-20 minutes more, or until the macaroni is soft. Stir in the chopped fresh or frozen basil and cook 5 minutes more. Serve hot, with freshly grated Parmesan cheese if desired.

If you store leftover soup in the refrigerator or freezer, the macaroni will absorb some of the liquid, leaving you with a thicker soup (and puffier macaroni too!) You can add a little more chicken stock when you reheat the soup if you want, or just enjoy it a bit thicker, which is what I did.

(Edit June 2011 - I have recently learned that if Dreamfields pasta is cooked for a long time or reheated it increases the glycemic index, so this recipe is probably phase 3 if made with Dreamfields.) If made with whole wheat macaroni, this soup would be approved for phase 2 or 3 of the South Beach Diet, or any type of low-glycemic eating plan.

Nutritional Information?
I chose the South Beach Diet to manage my weight partly so I wouldn't have to count calories, carbs, points, or fat grams, but if you want nutritional information for a recipe, I recommend entering the recipe into Calorie Count, which will calculate it for you.

Posts may include links to my affiliate account at Amazon.com, and Kalyn's Kitchen earns a few cents on the dollar if readers purchase the items I recommend, so thanks for supporting my blog when you shop at Amazon!

Posts may include links to my affiliate account at Amazon.com, and this blog earns a few cents on the dollar if readers purchase the items I recommend, so thanks for supporting my blog when you shop at Amazon!

I hesitatae to buy sausage because I must keep my salt down, so now I stir-fry a mixture of ground pork and beef plus all the seasoning s that you would find in a particular typre of sausage, i.e. for Italian: garlic, oregano, thyme, chili pepper: for mid East recipes I add garlic, cumin, coriander, paprika, hot sauce. This way I get all the flavours wothout the high sodium .

Oh how we love soups this time of year, especially the hearty ones. I make a similar soup and sometimes add some drained and rinsed cannelini beans to it too. That idea came about out of necessity. Had some unexpected company and needed to extend the soup. It worked.

This recipe looks mouth wateringly delicious. I'm so glad I have fresh basil in the freezer! I like the extra fennel in it too. A woman of my own heart.

Sounds great and I look fwd to making it tomorrow evening. However, not having tried it yet, so not being exactly sure of the flavors, do you think that kale would be a good addition in this soup? Thanks!

I think chopped kale or thin ribbons of kale would be a great addition to this soup. I'd add the kale when you add the macaroni, unless you like it a little more crisp, then I'd add it when the macaroni is partly cooked. Love to hear how it turns out!

I made this tonight to keep me going through final exam revisions, and it was great! Plus, now I have a freezer full of leftovers. So simple and cheap to make and it seems like it would be fun to play around with too (like maybe adding beans as another commenter said). Not that it needs any changes at all. :)

I made your soup recipe this evening and it was a big hit! Fennel is not one of the spices I use, so this soup gave me a new taste adventure.

I follow your blog regularly and have tried several recipes which are now in my regular rotation.

I also appreciate the comment from LibbyD about using meat with her own spices rather than the sausage. As I was making the soup, I wondered if it would be too bland (i.e., not salty enough), but found that the salt from the sausage was more than enough.

Thank you for all the great recipes you create and share from other bloggers. It's much appreciated here in mid-Michigan.

Tried it with a twist. I used Andouille sausage rather than Italian, and substituted some okra and Cajun spices for the basil. I also used whole wheat pasta to keep my blood sugar down.Turned out quite well for those of us who like spicy soups.

Oh, I made a vegetarian version of this soup with fake meat, and it was sooo good and warming in this cold weather that I have been having recently. I love pasta soups, and this one made a huge batch. Great, healthy, warming, and not to hard to make either.The new layout for this blog is nice, too!

I made this dish last weekend and it was a hit! I've learned that many sausages in casings are in pork casings and I don't eat pork. My butcher was kind enough to add the sausage spices to ground turkey for me so I could proceed as planned with this for dinner. I'm so glad that he did. We loved it and were so glad to have left-overs to continue enjoying it for a few more days! Thank you for sharing the recipe.

I know that I have previously commented on this recipe, but I just love it so much that I have to comment again! I made this for dinner last night and will be enjoying the left overs for lunch the rest of the week. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a hearty, filling, soul warming, yummy meal.

Thanks for joining the conversation! I love hearing from readers and even though I can't always reply to every comment, I will always answer specific questions on a recipe as soon as possible. Sometimes I'm answering by iPhone, so my replies may be short!

Comments don't appear on the blog until they're approved by me, so no need to try again if you don't see it when you post the comment! Please make your signature a link to your site if you're a blogger, but other links posted within the body of the comment will never be published.

Food Blogger Love!

Copyright Notice

All Photos and Original Text (C) Copyright: 2005-2015, By Kalyn's Kitchen® LLC. I grant permission for photos and recipe links to be copied to social media and other sites, but not recipe text. All Other Rights Reserved. (Other bloggers may post their adapted version of any recipe found here, with their own photos and recipe text, but please link back to the original inspiring recipe on this site.)

Kalyn's Kitchen is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.